


Aftermath

by satin_doll



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: AU, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Post TST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-09
Updated: 2018-05-09
Packaged: 2019-05-04 13:19:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14593863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/satin_doll/pseuds/satin_doll
Summary: Sherlock deals with losing Mary Watson.





	Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MaybeItsJustMyType](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaybeItsJustMyType/gifts).



> Not really a story - more a quick, simple study. 
> 
> I didn't know Kiki personally, only through her lovely stories and comments. She was one of the first people to follow me on tumblr. But I feel I know her through her friends, who loved her dearly, and I know that this fandom and the Sherlolly ship are much poorer for her loss.

Nothing was the same without her.

How many times did he pick up his phone to text her - some random bit of information, an odd question on some esoteric subject to which he was certain she would know the answer, an excited announcement of a new case or clue - before he remembered. 

She was gone. 

All these...feelings. He was familiar with the pain of loss. In his life he’d lost so much more than people knew. He knew how to put it aside and get on with things, how to divide himself, shunt the emotional baggage aside, but this...this was different. 

_She_ was different. 

She was his friend.

His _friend_.

He was still getting used to it, the very idea that he had any friends at all, let alone one that he…

Say it. Go ahead. Say the word.

_Loved_.

Loved, appreciated, held in the highest esteem for her intelligence, wit, perception, courage...yes, she was different, she was his friend...and he loved her.

The whole notion should have been abhorrent, antithetical to everything he was, but he found himself embracing it wholeheartedly. 

How silly to think it would last. 

John...his friendship with John wasn’t the same. John, if left to his own devices, would have destroyed her, annihilated everything that made her who - and what - she was. John, with his straight-laced ideas of love and marriage and all those cosy little institutions that served no purpose other than to complicate life. 

Well, John was also his friend, in a different way. John served as a counter-balance of sorts. John was social lubricant, eased the difficulty of dealing with other people, taught him ways to get past the tricky interactions that had plagued his life and career. John was, for the most part, easier to get along with than most people, partly due to his own strange predilection for seeking out danger, adventure, his odd fascination with dangerous people. For a while he had felt almost _dependent_ on John to show him how to be...human. As their relationship grew and changed, he viewed it less and less from the standpoint of interaction and more as companionship, despite John’s tendency toward histrionics.

He’d never even considered, in his wildest dreams, that he would be friends with a woman. 

Women were either adversaries or necessary evils, and he generally dealt with them as such. 

But _this_ woman...this woman was neither of those. 

The pain of her loss confounded him, shut him down, turned his world - his _mind_ \- into chaos. 

 

He wandered, physically and mentally. Memories plagued him. Even his mind palace turned traitor, pulling him into rooms full of images, voices, ideas, all of which centered around her. He had counted on her for so many things: for advice, information, support. She had known him, _understood_ him in ways no one else had.

He missed her, missed the surety of her, of simply knowing she was _there_.

The guilt was overwhelming. 

He had put her in harm’s way with his arrogance, his vicious, petulant sense of superiority. He may as well have pulled the trigger himself. 

There was no one he could tell. That was his fault too, that he was so separate, so isolated, that everyone assumed it didn’t affect him.

Because he was Sherlock Holmes. The Massive Intellect. The machine. 

The man with no feelings. 

He would have laughed at this, but the laughter would most certainly dissolve into uncontrollable tears. 

And so he did what he always did, when faced with conundrums, when he ran up against the unthinkable, when life became a ridiculous puzzle of conflict and entanglements that made his head ache and his insides a mixture of molten lead and exploding world.

He turned to the only other woman he would ever call friend, the only other woman he could depend on without question, the only other woman he would... _love_. 

She answered the door, took one look at him, and pulled him inside. Inside her home, her life, her self. Despite his failings, his brutal treatment of her over the span of years they’d known each other, despite, despite, despite...she loved him. Unconditionally, completely. He knew he didn’t deserve it, knew it was irrational, probably insane. 

But he loved her the same way.

“Molly…” he said, and that was all he needed to say. She slid her arms around him, pressed herself close.

“Shhh,” she whispered. “It will be okay.”

And somehow he knew that - eventually - it would be. 


End file.
